


a spirit of persuasion, only

by clarityhiding



Series: Team RedBird [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Teen Titans (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, New 52
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-19
Updated: 2015-09-19
Packaged: 2018-04-21 11:06:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4826777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clarityhiding/pseuds/clarityhiding
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Again with Oracle's vague references to things being different from what she's used to. Not exactly the omniscient mouthpiece of a god that the name implies, then (but hey, he's not a bird or a restaurant chain, so it's not like Tim can judge). "The intel you keep offering me isn't very useful if it's all out of date."</p>
<p>
  <i>"It's not out of date! Probably. I mean—it's complicated. Look, are you going after Wonder Girl or not? Because word on the street is you're on a deadline if you want her in one piece."</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	a spirit of persuasion, only

**Author's Note:**

> This is a direct sequel, so it kind of won't make sense if you haven't read the previous story in the series? Pretty much follows the course of Teen Titans #1–14.
> 
> Also, this is pretty much Tabithian's fault and a direct result of the conversations we had [here](http://archiveofourown.org/comments/36339816) and [here](http://archiveofourown.org/comments/38965568). So. Blame her?

This is getting ridiculous, and Tim needs to have words with someone in his family, because he knows he swept the penthouse for bugs less than 24 hours ago, and only family could have hidden any well enough for him to miss. (Tim suspects Jason, since he's already cleared out all of Dick's favorite hiding spots, Tim isn't exactly on Batgirl's radar right now, Damian wouldn't think Tim is worth his time, and Bruce is still pretending he doesn't know where Tim is.)

_"I'm just saying that New York City is a horrible place to set up a superhero team because property damage."_ The digitally-masked voice must be coming from one or more omnidirectional speakers because Time can't pinpoint any specific origin-point.

"I'm not trying to start a team. I just want to help some people out, _Jason_." Tim is still undecided on whether it's to his benefit to acknowledge Jason's creepy stalking. He's choosing to do so right now mostly because it's driving him nuts, trying to figure out where the bugs are that he missed.

The electronic laugh is grating and, frankly, more than a little sinister. _"C'mon, Red. You know I'm not the Hood."_

Tim does know. He's been dreading something like this ever since the other day when his computer screen went dark and words started appearing. "Oracle."

_"Got it in one. Why the pissy face? You know you like me."_

"I don't even _know_ you," Tim protests. He doesn't—Oracle claims to know all about him, but Tim's never even heard of her. (Him? But oracles were traditionally female back in ancient Greece, weren't they?) Tim hasn't survived this long by trusting just anyone who comes his way, claiming they want to help.

_"You used to."_ Because Tim barely knows the person and he already knows that being as enigmatic as possible is one of Oracle's favorite pastimes.

"Tell me about the Superboy," Tim says instead of pursuing that particular line of thinking. After all, if he's going to have to deal with a stalker, he may as well try and get as much information as possible. He can always run his own checks on what Oracle tells him later. "You mentioned his fathers, plural?"

_"Oh man. Your friends have the most interesting families."_

"There is no Superboy." Friends? What?

_"He might still be in his clone pod. Everything else in the world is fucked up, so that wouldn't be surprising."_

Cloning? "Superman wouldn't let anyone clone him." Not that people wouldn't try if they had a viable DNA sample to work with.

_"Eh, 'let' makes it sound like someone asked permission, and Luthor isn't exactly the type to bother with something like that. He's SB's other dad, by the way. Unless he's not anymore."_

Again with Oracle's vague references to things being different from what she's (screw it, Tim's going to assume the feminine until he's corrected) used to. Not exactly the omniscient mouthpiece of a god that the name implies, then (but hey, he's not a bird or a restaurant chain, so it's not like Tim can judge). "The intel you keep offering me isn't very useful if it's all out of date."

_"It's not out of date! Probably. I mean—it's complicated. Look, are you going after Wonder Girl or not? Because word on the street is you're on a deadline if you want her in one piece."_

* * *

Tim tracks Cassie Sandsmark—"Wonder Girl"—down to a lonely stretch of PCH because he was going to do it anyway, not because of anything Oracle said.

(Mostly.)

(Her gleeful report that a paramilitary helicopter is enroute to rendezvous with Cassie in less than an hour doesn't hurt to hurry things along, though.)

* * *

`Alright, I take back what I said earlier. The wings aren't COMPLETELY useless. Just stupid-looking.`

Tim clenches his teeth and tries to focus on what's happening around him and not on how Oracle has managed to hack the display in his mask. There's no point in responding to her, either. Oracle can't hear him right now anymore than she can speak to him aloud.

(That wouldn't be the case if Tim still wore a comm unit. But comms are for people with partners, with teams. These days, Tim has neither.)

Not that Tim wants to encourage Oracle's interest in him. He still knows nothing about her aside from the fact that she claims to possess a great deal of information on both him and a large number of metahuman teens. The latter could theoretically prove useful to him, except that, because of the nature of the information she provides, Tim has no real way of verifying anything. So far, so good. It's just. Well.

`Her armor comes out of nowhere? Huh, that's new.`

She keeps saying things like that.

* * *

> `RedBird: Say I believe you and trust what you know. `
> 
> `RedBird: What can you tell me about this bug-thing?`
> 
> `Oracle: Bug thing? What, like Killer Moth? Don't really follow Gotham freaks.`
> 
> `RedBird: Read the newsfeeds, Oracle. Bug-thing in Los Angeles? Someone's calling it Skitter?`
> 
> `Oracle: Never heard of it. Come back to NYC, already. I got you a present!`
> 
> `RedBird: I need to follow up on this first.`
> 
> `Oracle: Fine. But get WG to help you. Use your reverse psych thing when she resists, it'll totally work.`

  


* * *

Since she's basically useless, Tim isn't about to listen Oracle's advice. But Cassie follows him anyway when he goes after Skitter (who turns out to be a shape-changing metahuman named Celine, not a bug at all), and Tim isn't sure if that's because Cassie wants to or because he used his "reverse psych thing" to convince her to help him.

Oracle claims to know all about the kids Tim's trying to help, but he can't confirm a lot of what she says. The rest has either proved wrong or just isn't relevant at this time. It's rare that she tells him something he actually needs that he can't find on his own (where someone is, what they can do, who is after them).

When it comes down to it, there's only one teen hero that Oracle's been right about 100% of the time.

Unfortunately, Red Robin really doesn't need intel on himself.

* * *

`What happened back there?`

The train he's hitching a ride back east on is moving again when Oracle's message appears in the lenses of his mask, and Tim's briefly distracted by the thought that she was oddly quiet while he was busy in the town, no kibitzing or comments. The thought is a fleeting one, though, quickly scuttling aside to make room for more pressing problems. Namely, helping Miguel (and seriously, what the hell—the help's appreciated, sure, but so-called "Bunker" choosing Tim's train car out of all the others the country is just too much of a coincidence to sit well with him) calm down Celine, now that she's awake and with them again.

`It was weird, Red. Your signal went dead and I couldn't get through. I don't like it.`

Celine is definitely more important than his weird e-stalker, Tim assures himself. Plus, he still has no way to respond to Oracle when he's suited up, so it's not like he's being actively rude when he ignores her.

`Fine, be all mysterious, but I'm making a note. You and your friends can have a play date there when you're all set up in your mountain or tower or whatever you use for a base.`

Really, this would all be a lot more tolerable if Oracle could just decide whether Tim's her boss or her kid brother.

* * *

Oracle's present turns out to be a piece of kryptonite.

Delivered via FedEx, because that is just such a stellar idea when Tim's trying to hide out in a building owned by Lex Luthor. A-plus stealth work, there.

Miguel and Celine are just starting to settle in (well, Miguel is—Tim suspects Celine's not likely to feel settled anywhere ever again), so Tim doesn't think this is the best time to broach the topic of the unknown party with an unclear agenda who refuses to leave him the hell alone. 

Though, now that he thinks about it, Tim hasn't heard a peep out of Oracle since he got back from California. Maybe this means she's found someone else to harass. He can only hope.

* * *

A second package arrives at the penthouse a week later. This one contains, among other things, a number of high-end comm units. Tim's going to have to have a talk with Lucius Fox about that, because whoever the hell Oracle is, he's pretty sure she shouldn't have access to these kinds of WayneTech toys.

He feels a little guilty about holding onto the comms instead of returning them. At the same time, Tim sees the appeal of having a third party obtain his gadgetry for him. Particularly since he's not too keen on Bruce keeping a close eye on him and what he's doing. (Contingency plans on top of contingency plans; Tim learned from the best.)

Tim isn't sure what to make of the T insignias of various sizes also included in the package. Two of them slot perfectly into the shoulders of his suit, replacing the Red Robin emblem, but their purpose remains a mystery.

When Tim finally breaks down and asks, Oracle, of course, refuses to enlighten him.

`I was told you were trained by the world's greatest detective. Kinda making me doubt that here, Red.`

* * *

Two days after that, there's a knock on the penthouse door, and for the first time in weeks, Oracle's digital voice echoes through the penthouse.

_"Visitors just magically appeared in the hall. Probable friendlies, though Kid Flash's hair is creepily tame and Solstice is all smokey. Good grooming and palette-swapping may be their versions of evil goatees, so. Might be time to dust off your Bat paranoia."_

"Who—" Celine starts to say, but whatever she was going to ask gets lost in the confusion when Miguel opens the door and with it a whole new can of worms. Two kids tumble in as soon as the door's out of the way; from what Tim briefly glimpses through the doorway, they're here courtesy of Danny. Both new arrivals are injured and half-frozen, so it looks like explaining Oracle to his houseguests is a task Tim will just have to put off until later. Oh darn. (Just as well, since Tim still has no idea what explanation he could possibly give.)

Seriously, Tim really needs to find the time to do another bug-sweep in between crises.

* * *

It seems Tim also needs to revise his security protocols, because he was _positive_ he'd cleared out all of Oracle's cameras, mics, and speakers (along with those that Bruce and Dick felt the need to leave while he was on the other side of the country—because _family_ ) after he got Bart and Kiran settled in. Yet those are most certainly Oracle's dulcet (ha) digital tones calling out after Tim and the others as they race out the door (or window, as the case might be) to help out none other than Cassie Sandsmark against (what the hell, how did this even happen, Tim thought the whole thing was a _joke_ on Oracle's part) some kind of Superboy.

_"Don't forget your special K, Red!"_

(Tim was going to leave it, but if this _is_ an honest-to-god clone of the man of steel then Oracle may have a point. Even Batman has his emergency stash of kryptonite just in case Superman ever goes off the rails.)

* * *

_"Hey, so. Tactile telekinesis, that's a thing Superboy does. Don't touch him, don't let him touch you, don't touch anything SB's touching,"_ Oracle informs Tim over the comm in his ear. Which is what he gets for using one of her presents, he supposes—of course she hard-wired in her own backdoor so she can go all Jiminy Cricket on him.

Tim weighs the risks of taking Oracle at her word against this being a sneaky attempt on her part to trick him into believing Superboy has abilities he doesn't. So far, it doesn't seem like Oracle has ever deliberately misled him. Those times she's been wrong, she's come across as genuinely confused, insofar as anything can come across via her chosen methods of communication.

With a sigh, Tim relays the information to the others.

_"Thenhowarewesupposedtofighthim?"_ Bart asks, which is a good point once Tim slows it down to real time and parses it. (Tim already knows the answer—you don't. You don't fight any Kryptonian, because the odds are never in your favor, even when you have a kryptonite ace up your sleeve.)

_"Projectiles,"_ Miguel suggests, creating several psychic bricks and throwing them. All of the bricks bounce off Superboy, who doesn't even seem to notice them. Really, what was Miguel expecting would happen? Big blue isn't called the man of steel for nothing.

"Diplomacy," Tim says, because if everything that Oracle's told him about Superboy is true, the kid is just like the rest of them. A victim in all this, more prey of N.O.W.H.E.R.E. Created, manipulated, insecure.

(Oracle likes to tell Tim about Superboy, has been talking Tim's ear off about the guy for weeks now, over comms and computers alike. According to her, Superboy is important to Tim, even though Tim's never met him. _"You need him,"_ Oracle told him early on.

Tim? Tim doesn't know what to think—Oracle also sent him _kryptonite_ , so he's feeling a tad confused.)

"Talk to him, maybe you can get through. We're here to help metahuman teens, he pretty much fits the definition," Tim says, hoping the others will listen to him. Hoping Bart can rein in his eagerness, Cassie her anger.

_"Also, he might be your future BFF and mind-controlled. Or he's possibly an evil clone-of-a-clone bent on your total destruction,"_ Oracle volunteers over her private line to Tim. If the filter digitally masking her voice allowed it, he suspects she'd sound positively gleeful. _"Maybe try breaking his nose to show your good intentions? That usually works for me."_

* * *

Somehow they all survive Superboy (the kryptonite may have helped a lot with that, but Tim's not about to give Oracle the satisfaction of having been right by acknowledging it). Unfortunately, Bart's impatience overrode sound judgement (Tim barely knows the kid and he already suspects that a lack of patience is something of a frequent problem for Bart), and half-way through the fight Kid Flash chose to completely ignore Tim's warning about Superboy's tactile telekinesis.

_"Ugh, this is totally why SB used to explain his TTK every battle, isn't it? Because even his allies kept forgetting what the fuck it did,"_ Oracle gripes as Tim and the rest rush Bart to the local branch of S.T.A.R. Labs. Tim's hoping his contact there will have some idea of how to counteract whatever Superboy did and keep Bart from vibrating himself into nothingness.

If Virgil doesn't know how to save Bart, Tim doesn't know what he's going to do. He's already tried to contact the Flash—he even went so far as to ask Oracle to try, though apparently her devious tentacles don't extend into the Watchtower's communication network (which, yes, good to know she has some limitations, but not really helpful at all right now).

Tim already doesn't have that many friends. He really doesn't want to lose this one.

* * *

Oracle wants Tim to steal Virgil's robotic raptor for her because, apparently, _"I need it, Red."_

"I don't have the time to do your shopping right now, O," Tim mutters. He hopes none of the others hear him. Now is really not a good time for his team (and how the hell did Tim even end up with a team—better yet, how did Oracle know this was coming) to start wondering about him talking to himself. "Kind of trying to keep Bart alive, here."

A crackling of static that might be Oracle's version of a sigh causes Tim to wince. _"Yeah, you tend to go off the deep end when he dies, so point."_

Wait, what. "What?"

_"Nothing. Oh, hey—not that it's super-relevant to the current issue, but I did tell you Bart's from the future, right?"_

"What?!"

_"He really should remember that, though, and like I said before—his hair's all wrong. So, y'know. There may be a good chance he's an evil mirror-universe double."_

* * *

Tim is about 72% sure that Oracle is just Barbara tormenting him for shits and giggles in her free time. The sense of humor seems about right, and she certainly has the necessary skills to hack his computers and comms and bug the penthouse.

Unfortunately, Tim has no idea how to go about confronting Barbara without letting on to what's going on just in case he's completely wrong. The last thing Tim needs is for it to get back to Bruce (or, even worse, the demon spawn) that Tim's been compromised.

Plus, he's pretty sure Barbara has better things to do with her time than use snark to slowly drive him insane.

* * *

_"You need to break SB out."_

"Yeah, that was the plan," Tim mutters under his breath, though he's starting to think that what he _needs_ to do is stop keeping his comm in all the time. Oracle doesn't seem all that keen on letting anyone else know she's there (Tim's pretty sure he managed to convince Celine that the penthouse has an elaborate A.I. looking after it; none of the others seem to have even noticed Oracle's presence), so she'd probably keep quiet as long as he isn't wearing it.

Or maybe she'd just start airing Tim's dirty laundry to the entire team over the hidden speakers that Tim still hasn't been able to find. No, much better to just grit his teeth and bear it.

_"Get these idiots moving, then. Rescuing Superboy from his N.O.W.H.E.R.E. overlords—high priority, very important."_

Tim shifts from foot to foot, glancing at the grungy door leading to Danny the Street, then back at the group on the couch, silently watching him. "I started this to help metahuman teens, and that's what Superboy is. I understand distrusting him—he beat us pretty badly, last time—and not wanting to help. But remember that, when it comes down to it, he's not that different from you."

"Except for the part where he's an alien," Cassie spits out, glaring at Tim.

"Alsoprettymuchevil," Bart adds, Miguel murmuring noises of agreement. Celine at least has the grace to look mildly guilty about not volunteering. 

"He's not evil. He's mostly just confused," Tim reminds them. "N.O.W.H.E.R.E. grew him in a tube and no doubt lied to him from the start. At the very least he deserves to be given a chance at a real life."

A fair amount of grumbling and guilt-tripping ensues, but in the end Tim has the whole team following him through the door.

* * *

The Teen Titans rescue Superboy from N.O.W.H.E.R.E., but get captured and sidetracked along the way.

It's clear Oracle's pretty pissed when Tim finally finds a moment to boot up his computer after they all finally stagger back to the penthouse. As soon as the machine is up and running, words are flying across the screen.

> `What the hell, Red! Next time bloody well tell me when you go into secret underground fortresses with no cell or satellite reception! I can't believe you did that--do you have any idea how bored I got?`

  
"Sorry, O," Tim says, too tired to even try typing his response. He's alone in his room; as long as no one is listening at the door, he should be fine. "Didn't mean to make you worry." 

> `Tell me you at least saved Superboy so you won't go crazy and start down the path of another clone saga. Because from what I heard, no one wants to go through THAT again.`

"I. Wait, what? Clone saga?" Tim tries to process that, finds he just can't, too exhausted mentally, physically, and emotionally to follow one of Oracle's enigmatic conversations. "Yay, Scarlet Spider?" he offers instead, because that's the best he can do right now.  


> `Ugh. Sometimes you are such a nerd.`

  


* * *

Tim's in the backseat of a cab, six blocks from Lex Towers, when his tablet automatically switches over to the messenger app.

> `Oracle: So WG's destroying the penthouse.`
> 
> `RedBird: What.`
> 
> `Oracle: You might tell her she doesn't need the evil soul-sucking armor, btw.`
> 
> `RedBird: WHAT`
> 
> `Oracle: The Magic Was In Her All Along.`
> 
> `Oracle: Ooo, that reminds me. Ask her about her dad. >:)`

  
If Oracle says anything else after that, Tim misses it because he's left the cab far behind and is in the middle of changing into his Red Robin gear in a shady alley.

(With all the craziness that follows, Tim forgets to ask Cassie about her dad. It probably isn't important anyway.)

* * *

Cassie's psycho ex and equally psycho armor necessitate that Tim and Superboy (Kon, Tim's supposed to think of him as Kon, now) join her on an emergency field trip to Cambodia. Oracle is uncharacteristically silent on the trip over. Either she knows how this whole thing is going to turn out (which he wouldn't put past her, the way she talks sometimes), or she doesn't know anything at all and is keeping quiet until she knows more (highly unlikely, she seems to revel in relating information which may or may be true).

"These markings," Tim says later, when they're deep in the ruins and he's examining pictographs on a wall. "They're older than everything else. This, here—this is the Mark of Trigon."

_"Oh, hell. I thought I'd shoved all the Ancient Evil crap off on Red Hood."_

"Have you heard of him? Trigon?" Tim asks, carefully phrasing his question so that he could be addressing Cassie or Kon. Last thing he needs is for either of them to think he's talking to himself.

_"Bad-ass motherfucker who rules a ridiculous number of hell dimensions and is also Raven's dad. What did I tell you, Red? Your friends have the most interesting families."_

Which isn't helpful at all, of course.

(Who the hell is Raven?)

* * *

Eventually, Cassie gets her (evil, soul-sucking) armor back from her ex. Tim's starting to wonder about how good an idea that is—it's practically a ticking time bomb, and, if Oracle's right about Cassie having innate powers, not something Cassie needs to have. Still, the way things work out, it's better for her to have the armor than to let it lie around to use or be abused by someone with weaker willpower.

Oracle still isn't happy about them finding the Mark of Trigon at Angkor Wat. She also hasn't said much on the topic of the mysterious Raven, just that Raven is likely to be a Titan in the future. And apparently the Trigon factor may cause this Raven to be a somewhat-problematic ally. _"She keeps going evil, so. Not entirely sure if you want to bother recruiting her? Though I guess everyone should get a shot at redemption."_

She goes silent again after that. Maybe she really was shaken up by Cassie's armor having some sort of connection to Trigon. The synthesized voice makes it hard for Tim to get a read on Oracle, which he always finds to be more than a little disconcerting—he's used to having at least some clue as to how a person feels. With Oracle, a lot of the time he's not sure if she's truly concerned or just being flippant.

Of course, when it comes to Oracle, a lot of the time Tim just straight up isn't sure about anything.

* * *

He and Cassie and Kon are back in New York and riding up to the (again) newly-renovated penthouse with the others when Oracle finally pipes up again in Tim's ear.

_"Not to be a worry-wart or anything, but someone's been trying to ping your computer for the past hour? Possibly Nightwing? Maybe Batman? But it's. Red, all the Bats are being called back to Gotham for something. You shouldn't go."_

Tim makes his excuses to the rest of the team and heads for his room, making sure the door's shut tight before replying. "If Batman needs me in Gotham, O, I'm not staying here."

Oracle starts rattling off numbers. _"Five out of nine Bats have died as a direct result of doing stupid shit, one of them twice. Four of those deaths were caused by or directly involved family members. Two of the ones who died were Robins."_

None of which makes any sense to Tim. "The second Robin's the the only Bat—and Robin—who's ever died," he points out. "You realize I'm even less likely to listen when you bypass prevarication entirely and go on to straight-out lying, right?"

_"Bat-family get-togethers mean big bad guys and lots of danger. This is a bad idea,"_ Oracle insists. A big frowny face pops up on most of the screens of Tim's computer, replacing the blue triangle Oracle usually uses to represent herself. It would seem she's actually being serious for once. _"Red. The last Bat-family team-up I saw, you nearly died. Stay here. Please."_

"And we needed all hands on deck when the Court of Owls happened," Tim reminds her. He tugs the Titans T-insignia out of the shoulder of his suit and drops it on his bed, then slips the Red Robin-insignia into the empty slot. In Gotham Tim's a Bat, not a Titan. "I'm going, and that's final."

"Going where?"

It takes Tim a moment to realize Oracle isn't the one who spoke. "Oh. Kiran. Sorry, I didn't see you there."

"Actually, I was hoping to talk to you?" Kiran is clinging to the doorway (and it's a sign of just how anxious Tim is that he didn't even hear her open the door), looking lost and upset, and Tim hesitates. The last few months have been trying on all of them, but in some ways Kiran's had it the worst—captured, tortured, experimented on, escaping only to have it happen all over again. Whatever N.O.W.H.E.R.E. did has left her so messed up that she can't even look like herself anymore. Just Solstice.

"Can it wait a few days? I've got to leave town—family business. Sorry."

"I. I guess?"

"Great." Tim tries to muster up an encouraging smile for her. "I won't be gone long," he calls back over his shoulder as he swoops out the window. "Promise!"

* * *

_"I wasn't talking about the Court of Owls."_

_"The silent treatment? Really? I know you're alone right now, you could at least acknowledge my cryptic remarks."_

_"...fine. Be a rude little twit and throw a temper tantrum. See if I care."_

* * *

_"Feeling better?"_

_"Red?"_

_"You're not still mad, are you?"_

* * *

_"Okay, it's been ten hours. Starting to get a little worried here."_

* * *

` Red?`

`You there?`

 

`Red Robin?`

 

 

`...Tim?`


End file.
